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39 Articles

Tech Leaders Enlisted To Help The Newspaper Industry

September 18, 2009 by 19 Comments

Call to help newspapers

It is pretty obvious to everyone that the newspaper industry is in a tiny bit of trouble. They have thus far failed to reach the rapidly changing landscape of news, online news at that. They must do something to keep our interests up, or end up flailing on the ground. Microsoft and Google among others have recently entered the picture with solutions to the problem and some fresh eyes from a digital perspective.

Leading edge tech companies enterend the picture with a plea from the Newspaper Association of America on how they can monetize content online through transactions or enhanced ad targeting. Microsoft submitted a news river system that resembles TweetDeck and Sobees. Google is looking at developing an extension of Google Checkout that would help newspapers charge for content through a micropayment system. IBM as well as Oracle have submitted proposals that look at the use of content management systems.

So far the only shining example of the possibilities newspapers have to push things forward is Microsoft’s Next Generation Newspaper that pulls in all sorts of data such as RSS feeds, photos, videos, updates and news from across multiple news as well as social networks, into an information hub. So what does all of this mean for you? Newspapers might not be dead, they are in the hot seat and looking at the best of the best to help them out of the jam with intuitive solutions that meet today’s news viewing needs.

What would you like to see newspapers do to engage you as an online news viewer?

[via NiemanLabs]

Last Day To Preorder Your Bus Pirate

July 3, 2009 by 31 Comments

Bus Pirate banner by Aaron Silber http://theajblog.com/

Update, Saturday July 4th, 2009: All preorders are closed.

Today is the last day to pre-order a Bus Pirate. Get your own Bus Pirate, fully assembled and shipped worldwide, for only $30. We don’t plan to make more soon, this could be your last chance.

A special shout out to our partner, Seeed Studio, who handled the rush of orders like pros. The first pre-order is already being manufactured, and will ship as soon as possible. Seeed still has a few V2a PCBs if you’d like to roll your own Bus Pirate.

You’ve made this pre-order a huge success, and we’d like to make more projects available in the future. Were you just interested in the Bus Pirate? Should we arrange pre-orders of future Hack a Day hardware? Are there any past projects that we should revisit?

Continue reading “Last Day To Preorder Your Bus Pirate” →

Criminals Steal Credit Card Data Just By Wardriving

August 15, 2008 by 24 Comments

Anime doll holding VISA card
A federal grand jury in Boston has charged eleven people with the theft of more than 41 million credit and debit card numbers from retail stores. What makes this case interesting is that, although the defendants stole the data from retail establishments, they did so without ever having to leave their cars; they stole the numbers while wardriving. While the report doesn’t make it clear whether the targeted networks used weak encryption or were simply unsecured, it’s obvious that the security of your data is still not a top priority for many companies.

[photo: Mujitra]

Hack-A-Day Is Hiring!

April 10, 2008 by 34 Comments


It’s true, as much as [Will] and I like being a scrappy two person shop with a ‘never say die’ attitude, and penchant for fist pounding after successful compiles, we need more people (MOAR even). We’re looking for a few more contributors to help out with the daily posting, digging up the extra obscure, and especially the how-tos we’ve started to get back into.

This is a paid, freelancing position that requires professionalism, consistency, and reliability. We want to hear from people that are passionate about software/hardware hacking and growing Hack-A-Day. To apply, send the following to jobs@hackaday.com

  • A short bio about yourself
  • 3 example daily posts written in the style of Hack-A-Day
  • 3 how-to ideas you could personally execute. For examples of work we’ve done in the past, look here, here, here, and here.
  • A couple sentences on how you would improve the site either through features or content
  • Any additional reasons why you would make a good fit for Hack-A-Day

Please do not send any attachments, especially not pictures of your sweet ride. An aversion to capital letters is not required, but definitely encouraged.

[picture courtesy of fbz]